Omicron Variant Represents 98% Of Positive Cases In US

The magnitude of substantial increase in coronavirus infection in the United States is largely related to the Omicron variant, which now represents about 98 percent of the positive cases in the country, according to the White House Covid-19 Response Team.

Providing the latest update on the pandemic at a routine press conference, CDC director Dr.Rochelle Walensky said that the current seven-day daily average of cases is about 751,000 cases per day, an increase of about 47 percent over the previous week.

The weekly average of hospital admissions is about 19,800 per day, which marks an increase of about 33 percent over the prior week. And the seven-day average of daily deaths is about 1,600 per day, which is an increase of about 40 percent over the previous week.

Dr.Walensky said that a preprint study of data from Kaiser Permanente Southern California, analyzed by academic partners with CDC collaboration, provided key insight into clinical outcomes among patients infected with the Omicron variant.

She revealed that the study showed substantially reduced risk of severe clinical outcomes in patients who are infected with the Omicron variant compared with Delta.

Additionally, this study found that those infected with Omicron who were hospitalized had a shorter duration of hospital stay compared to those with Delta.

The skyrocketing number of infections does not turn severe or lead to deaths as the New Omicron variant is said to be not as dangerous as the Delta variant, in spite of its fast-spreading nature.

White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Jeff Zients said the Biden administration has completed the purchase of another 600,000 treatment courses of GlaxoSmithKline’s monoclonal antibody treatment, and is in the process of ordering another half-million doses of AstraZeneca’s preventive therapy for immunocompromised individuals.

Dr.Tom Inglesby, who was previously Director of Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, has been named to lead the U.S. federal testing program.

Meanwhile, to increase access to Covid testing for the nation’s K-through-12 students, teachers, and school staff, the Biden Administration has announced that it will make available 10 million free diagnostic tests per month in schools. This will include 5 million rapid tests and 5 million lab-based PCR tests for schools to perform individual and pooled testing in classrooms.

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